The one who clapped was the man in Celestine’s retinue, La Catan. However, his expression looked anything but congratulatory.
To Conrad’s eyes, it was a mixture of resignation and regret.
“This has turned into quite an unexpected result, Your Highness.”
The words that tumbled from his lips were insolently polite. They were hardly words one would direct at a member of their own country’s royal family.
“La Catan. What do you mean by that?”
“Exactly what I said, Your Highness. …No, Lady Celestine.”
“That is rude, Lord La Catan!”
Charlotte rebuked La Catan in a sharp tone for addressing Celestine without the honorific of “Highness.”
But La Catan seemed to pay her no mind. He raised a single, shapely eyebrow and declared defiantly.
“Stand down, Charlotte. For a mere lady-in-waiting.”
“La Catan!”
At this, Celestine flew into a rage.
What was happening? Even Conrad couldn’t keep up.
Why would a trusted aide suddenly begin to mock his own country’s Princess Regent?
Only the former Emperor seemed to grasp the situation, watching the events unfold with his arms crossed.
With a sharpness that belied her age, Celestine interrogated La Catan.
“What is the meaning of this, La Catan? Do you intend to celebrate this engagement or not?”
“I am overjoyed. For you personally, Lady Celestine, this is a most joyous occasion.”
“What? What do you mean?”
“It is simple, Your Highness, the former Princess Regent. You, a member of the royal family, intend to collude with the Empire, the sworn enemy of the Eastern Kingdom.”
“That’s not true! This is for the good of the Eastern Kingdom!”
Celestine’s lion-like roar struck his ears.
Conrad was gradually beginning to understand the situation.
This noble named La Catan was against the marriage meeting. If he wished for the young King Hugues to seize the reins of political power, then he would want to diminish Celestine’s influence.
Ordinarily, a married Celestine would move to the Empire, and her influence over the Eastern Kingdom’s court would be lost. But a Princess Regent was still a Princess Regent.
Judging by the courage she had just displayed here, there was no doubt she was a political titan.
La Catan feared that she would continue to interfere in the politics of the Eastern Kingdom even while being married to Emperor Conrad. If he thought of it that way, everything made sense.
“…I had assumed the marriage meeting would be a failure. This is a pity.”
The nobles of the minority faction, from the Princess Regent’s perspective, must have sent La Catan along as a watchdog.
If, by some chance, the marriage were to be finalized, he was to ruin the meeting itself. Did they truly believe such a shallow plan would work?
No, it might have worked.
If Conrad himself hadn’t met Celestine beforehand and had come to the meeting reluctantly, he would have gleefully agreed to call it off at the first sign of trouble.
It wasn’t a marriage meeting he had wanted in the first place. In other words, this current situation was a product of pure chance.
“‘A pity’ is quite a thing to say. Since when has the House of High Count La Catan been able to voice objections to a royal marriage?”
“We cannot, of course. However, this is an order.”
“An order, you say?”
La Catan produced a parchment from his breast pocket, broke the wax seal, and spread it open.
“An order from His Majesty King Hugues of the Eastern Kingdom.”
The contents he read out in a clear, resonant voice were slightly different from what Conrad had expected.
“‘Should Celestine de Oiria agree to a betrothal with the emperor of an enemy nation, she will, at that very moment, be stripped of her position as Princess Regent, and her rights as a member of the royal family will be suspended indefinitely. By His Majesty’s Hand and Seal.’”
Translator’s note
The final phrase, Gyomei Gyoji (御名御璽), is a formal statement used on official imperial or royal documents in Japan, signifying the Emperor’s name and seal, authenticating the decree.
So it wasn’t a scheme by the nobles?
The thought that the young King Hugues would dismiss his own sister was something Conrad could never have predicted.
But it seemed it was the same for Celestine.
Snatching the parchment from La Catan’s hands, Celestine’s eyes darted over the words that had just been read, and then she collapsed to her knees.
“It is a pity, Lady Celestine. A great pity.”
La Catan shrugged, but he was unable to continue his words.
The one who had violently struck his composed face from the side was none other than the Imperial Emperor, Conrad himself.
He had never once in his life punched another person.
More than La Catan, who had fallen to the floor on his rear, Conrad himself was surprised by what he had done. After staring alternately at his clenched fist and at La Catan, Conrad issued a warning.
“…Lord La Catan. Forgive me, but I will have you cease insulting my future wife.”
The color of La Catan’s face turned red, then pale.
Clutching his struck cheek, he slowly rose to his feet.
“The Eastern Kingdom will lodge a formal protest regarding this matter.”
“A protest about what? I merely reprimanded an insolent noble who insulted the woman who is to become the Empress of the Empire.”
Put that way, La Catan had no retort. He had no allies here.
The guards from both nations, who had been about to rush into the shop upon hearing the commotion, were simply cowering at the sharp rebuke from the usually gentle Emperor.
Scrambling away in disgrace, La Catan fled the shop.
Celestine threw her arms around Conrad. Though slightly surprised by her unexpected forwardness, Conrad gently pulled his future wife into an embrace.
A reserved applause, this time from Shinobu, was offered. It was, without a doubt, an applause of blessing.
The circle of applause spread, continuing on and on for what felt like an eternity.
“I might have gone a little too far.”
Hugues, having received the report by fast horse, muttered to no one in particular.
In a few more days, the Empire would announce the engagement ceremony. In concert with that, the Eastern Kingdom would proclaim Celestine de Oiria’s removal from the royal family register.
“It is what Your Majesty deemed necessary. Please, believe in yourself.”
“Thank you. I shall.”
Reassured by his chief retainer, Hugues leaned his body back into the throne and let out a small sigh.
He had no regrets about exiling his sister, but he did feel apologetic.
She was the sister who had held the country together in his stead while he was still young. He loved her, and he was grateful to her. That was precisely why he absolutely could not allow her to marry into the Empire while retaining her position as Princess Regent.
He was still young.
He had no intention of losing to the adults in a battle of wits, but his form was still that of a child. It would take a little more time before he could face the Empire on his own.
In the meantime, what if his sister were to give birth to several sons?
It was not inconceivable that the pro-Celestine faction, still smoldering within the country, would rally behind one of those sons as a figurehead and march on La Parisia. The capital, a hub of transportation, was also in a location that was easy to attack. It would not fall, but he had to avoid internal chaos at all costs.
While his twelve-year-old mind considered all of this, Hugues’s true aim lay elsewhere.
“If I didn’t do this, sister would end up suffering, torn between the Eastern Kingdom and her husband.”
“With all due respect, I believe it was a wise consideration, Your Majesty.”
Celestine de Oiria would soon become simply Celestine.
Not the venomous woman of the Eastern Kingdom skilled in machinations and intrigue, but a nineteen-year-old bride, Celestine.
“You have worked hard, sister. From now on, Hugues will rule this country alone.”
It was both a farewell and a declaration of his resolve.
Though the two were now completely estranged, perhaps one day they might reconcile.
When that day came, he hoped they could talk as just Hugues and Celestine, sharing some delicious food at a tavern somewhere.
With such thoughts in his mind, Hugues began issuing a rapid-fire series of orders.
He had turned his sister from a princess into a commoner. The price for that was his to bear.
The tasks to be done seemed infinite, and there were still not many people he could entrust them to. For a while, he would have to carry the burden of everything himself.
He felt no anxiety. It was a path his sister had also walked.
He still kept his sister’s portrait inside the locket around his neck.